The Avett Brothers find themselves in an unusual situation at the dawning of 2009. Much of the country has just been through an extraordinarily difficult year. The music industry is morphing into an entirely different animal, with the value of recorded works continuing its spectacular nosedive toward zero. The Concord, North Carolina, band has strong ties to neighboring Charlotte, whose primary industry banking is in disarray at best (Bank of America), in shambles at worst (Wachovia). Most everyone across the nation is bracing themselves for a year that may well be even more difficult than the extraordinary one we just lived through.
Amidst all this, brothers Seth and Scott Avett and their bandmates are square in the midst of a glorious wave of prosperity that is probably beyond their wildest dreams. After years of gradually ascending as an independent act, they struck a deal with Rick Rubin to make their next album with him for the American/Columbia label. They routinely pack thousand-plus-capacity venues across the country. And, coming home to North Carolina in late December for their annual New Year’s Eve shindig, they managed to sell out not just one but two shows at Charlotte’s posh 2,100-seat Belk Theater, after an extraordinarily successful one-night event there for New Year’s Eve 2007.
The Avetts always have gone against the grain, but they almost surely never envisioned ringing in 2009 quite like this. The best they could aim for on the capper of this two-night stand, perhaps, was to deliver us from the new depression, at least for a little while. And with help from an expansive cast of cohorts openers Jessica Lea Mayfield, Paleface, and Jason Webley that’s precisely what they did.
The highlight of the slightly too long stretch of supporting acts was Mayfield’s “For Today”, on which she and her band were joined by the headliners Seth Avett on piano, Scott Avett at the mike dueting with Mayfield (plus Joe Kwon on cello). The song was a natural for collaboration, seeing as how the Avetts apparently became so enamored with it at one point that they began covering it themselves. Mayfield’s fairly easy to peg as a slightly more rootsy incarnation of Mazzy Star’s Hope Sandoval, but “For Today” is a step above, one of those instantly knowable songs that don’t come around every day, or for every artist.
Jessica Lee Mayfield and friends play “For Today” on New Year’s Eve at the Belk.
The Avetts took the stage at about 11:15 p.m., opting for one long set straight into the midnight countdown (rather than last year’s two-set performance in which they returned right before the magic hour). While they not surprisingly drew heavily on numbers from 2007’s breakthrough Emotionalism (the set-opening “Die Die Die”, “Will You Return”, “Salina”) and the 2008 EP The Second Gleam (“Murder In The City”, delivered solo by Scott), they also reached into their back pages for numbers both well-known (“Talk On Indolence”) and obscure (Seth’s spotlight-turn “In The Curve”).
And there were quite a few as-yet unreleased songs, though it’d be hard to call many of them “new”, given that the ardent hard-core Avett faithful sang along frequently, almost as fervently as they did on the older favorites. Best of the bunch may have been “I And Love And You”, which features no one on guitar (Seth moves to piano and Scott to drums, with Kwon on cello and Bob Crawford switching from upright to electric bass); and “Laundry Room”, with a key lyric that seemed especially appropriate for New Year’s Eve: “I am a breathing time machine.”
The Avett Brothers perform “Laundry Room” on New Year’s Eve at the Belk.
Perhaps the most revelatory selection of the night was a rare cover, a soulful reading of the 1967 Aretha Franklin hit “You Make Me Feel Like A Natural Woman”. Seth sang lead from behind the piano in another no-guitars arrangement. Gender-bending turns on hallmark tunes aren’t really new territory remember Lyle Lovett’s remake of Tammy Wynette’s signature “Stand By Your Man” but the Avetts weren’t playing it for novelty; it just seemed like something toward which they wished to apply their passion, and their singing. It worked precisely because passionate singing is at the heart of what the Avetts are all about.
The Avetts cover “Natural Woman” at the Belk, 12-31-08.
